Ruthless Creatures by J.T. Geissinger

I’m trying not to get angry, but heat is already working its
way up my neck. “It’s also in Massachusetts. You want me to
move across the country and leave my whole life here just so I
can live in a different state from you?”
“It’s only a five-hour drive from Manhattan.”
My voice rises. “Only?”
He exhales. “Fuck. You’re right. Forget it.”
I spin around in his arms and face him, staring at him
through the shadows. His eyes are closed. His jaw is set. It
looks like he’s decided this is the end of the conversation.
Guess I’ll have to set him straight about that.
“Kage. Look at me.”
Keeping his eyes closed, he says curtly, “Go to sleep.”
This bossy, hardheaded, infuriating man. The longer I
know him, the more blood pressure medication I’ll have to
take.
“No. We’re going to talk about this. Right now.”
“You know what the definition of a stalemate is? This,
right here. We can’t fix this, no matter how much talking we
do. So go to sleep.”
“Kage, listen to me—”
He sits up, pushes me onto my back, and straddles my
body. Then he gets right into my face and starts shouting.
“You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me. The best
thing, and also hands-down the fucking worst, because of who
I am and what I do and all the shit that goes along with that. I
can never have the white picket fence, Natalie. I can never
have Sunday brunch with friends or Thanksgiving with the inlaws
or picnics in the park or any of the other things normal
people do, because I’ll never be normal.
“My life doesn’t belong to me, do you understand? I made
a vow. I took an oath and sealed it with blood. The Bratva is
my family. The Brotherhood is my life. And there’s no way
out of it. Blood in, no out. Not ever.”